PHIL/RS 335
EVIDENTIAL CHALLENGE: PT. 2
GIEVETT, “A PASCALLIAN REJOINDER”
• Geivett begins by recasting the ground of the issue
somewhat.
• Rather than frame the issue in terms of positive and
negative atheism, or in terms of God-Talk and non
God-Talk, Gievett prefers a distinction between
Direct and Indirect atheological arguments.
• Direct: positive atheism (God does not exist).
• Indirect: 2 types.
• Failure of natural theology (defined in the note on p. 163c1) +
lack of evidence makes it unlikely that God exists.
• Presumption of atheism (is this the same as the presumption of
a-theism?).
TAKING AIM AT THE PRESUMPTION
• Geivett is interested in the last of these
possibilities which he identifies with Flew.
• As he spells out (163c2) he is trying to
address a number of concerns: articulating
and criticizing the position he represents as
Flew’s, justifying natural theology, and,
ultimately, advancing an essentially
Pascallian (that is, prudential) basis for
believing in God.
WHERE IS FLEW?
• As Geivett’s discussion of the presumption of
atheism makes clear, Flew’s position is a subtle one
that can be difficult to distinguish from similar,
though fundamentally different, positions.
• To label a-theism as negative atheism may ultimately be
more confusing than helpful, as it potentially confuses Flew’s
position with agnosticism.
• What Gievett does focus his attention on is the
epistemological concern for the burden of proof
and the analogy with a presumption of
innocence.
• As Gievett acknowledges, we shouldn’t make to much of
this analogy (he recognizes that it is not an attempt to
make an argument by analogy).
THEISTIC RESPONSES
• Geivett identifies two possible responses to
what he’s characterized as Flew’s position.
• One can accept the challenge and try to
provide a clear, unambiguous concept of the
divine and then try to demonstrate it’s reference
(“simple defeaters”).
• Alternatively, one can challenge the
presumption on the grounds that belief in God
doesn’t require justification or that it requires
justification different from the model advocated
by Flew (“rejoinders”).
SIMPLE DEFEATERS?
• In order to simply defeat the presumption, some successful
program of natural theology would have to be advanced.
• As we’ve reviewed them, and as Geivett acknowledges, the
traditional arguments have not been able to rationally
“compel belief in God”. At best, it seems, they’ve provided
enough reason to call into question positive atheism.
• Geivett does insist, however, that this accomplishment,
perhaps coupled with prudential concerns like those
advanced by Pascal, could be a potential simple defeater.
• At the very least, he insists, the limited success of the program
of natural theology surely require a rebuttal before a
negative atheism could be maintained (168c1).
A REJOINDER?
• As Geivett acknowledges in section 4 of his
article, the struggles of Natural Theology
would seem to make a rejection of the
presumption of a-theism a necessary first
step in successfully addressing the atheist
challenge.
• In order to advance towards this first step,
Geivett offers what he calls a “Pascalian
Rejoinder.”
• As he presents it, the rejoinder is based in two
claims (170c2).
PRESUMING THAT GOD DOES NOT
EXIST?
• It is obviously less than certain that this gloss on Flew
adequately captures the sense that Flew clearly
employs when arguing for a presumption of a-theism.
•
See on this, Flew’s rejoinder to Geivett (176c1).
• Given that Geivett chooses to interpret Flew in this way,
it is not surprising that he concludes that Flew’s position
is no different than positive atheism (174c1).
• However, as Flew emphasizes in his rejoinder, his
understanding of a-theism does not rule out an
openness to the divine, which is what Geivett insists is a
necessary first condition of any theistic demonstration.
WHAT IS PRUDENT?
• On this question, Geivett seems on safer ground.
• As he emphasizes, Flew’s position seems to amount to a
“wait and see” attitude, but such an attitude may not
adequately address the existential significance of belief.
•
It does seem important to know something about this issue, not just in
a disinterested intellectual or abstract way (like knowing whether
string theory is an adequate account of the fundamental forces
working in the universe), but in a “I don’t want to burn in hell” way.
• Geivett argues that Flew’s insistence on the logical priority of
a-theism over all forms of God-Talk is just not appropriate
given the importance of the issue.
• We might wonder, however, if this importance isn’t just an
effect of a theistic habit or prejudice.
•
After all, if we remain open to the questionableness of the divine, we
might find compelling reason to believe in a God who would reward
the a-theistic questioner and punish the “faithful” believer.
CLIFFORD, “WRONG TO BELIEVE”
• In this excerpt from “The Ethics of Belief,” Clifford
argues that it is immoral to believe a claim lacking
sufficient evidence to justify the belief.
• He begins his argument by probing our intuitions
using the thought experiment of of a ship-owner
preparing to send an old, worn ship full of
emigrants out on the open ocean.
• As Clifford relays it, the ship-owner had reasonable
doubts about the seaworthiness of the ship, but
overcame them with hope, and the conviction of
providence.
• What should we say about this decision?
BELIEF AND ACTION
• Clifford’s analysis of the thought-experiment leads him to
the conclusion that the ship-owner acted wrongly.
• As he insists, this is true whether or not the ship fails to survive
the voyage.
• This analysis relies on a tight connection between belief
and actions.
• On this view, beliefs lead to actions, either immediately
or down the line.
• The implication of this extends far beyond examples like
the ship-owner. As Clifford emphasizes, “No real belief…is
ever truly insignificant; it prepares us to receive more of
its like, confirms those which resembled it before, and
weakens others…” (181c1).
• As a result, even apparently trivial beliefs have significant
consequences for our actions and our character.
THE SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF BELIEF
• These implications are more profound then we might first
think.
• As Clifford recognizes, our beliefs have important social
dimensions, both in terms of the social context from
which they emerge and to which they return, as part of
our common heritage.
• “Our words, our phrases, our forms and processes and modes
of thought, are common property, fashioned and perfected
from age to age; an heirloom which every succeeding
generation inherits as a precious deposit and a sacred trust…”
(181c1).
• We see this clearly in the ship-owner example (his belief
had clear implications for the passengers) but it is true
more broadly and extensively.
EVERYONE IS RESPONSIBLE
• Clifford’s analysis suggests that everyone, not just
people in important positions, are responsible to
everyone else for the content and epistemological
justification of their beliefs.
• This is a significant responsibility. Is it a reasonable
one to impose?
• One thing we might consider is the psychological
reality that we generally want to believe.
• Epistemologically appropriate skepticism in the face of
many claims that confront us is a difficult, even scary,
position to maintain. Simple, unconsidered belief is much
more comfortable.
STOLEN COMFORT
• Clifford makes the case that we should resist this
psychological impulse with an analogy to stealing.
• Noting that the comfort of well-justified belief is the same as
that of mere belief, Clifford argues that in the second
situation, this comfort is unjustified, essentially stolen from our
common intellectual heritage.
• On this ground, Clifford suggests that it is our duty to do due
diligence on our beliefs, a duty to our common humanity.
•
“That duty is to guard ourselves from such beliefs as from a pestilence,
which may shortly master our own body and then spread to the rest
of the town” (182c 1).
• It is also a theft from ourselves, inasmuch as we weaken our
ability to appropriately evaluate beliefs every time we
uncritically accept a belief as true without this due diligence
(Ibid.).
SUMMING UP
• “…it is wrong always, everywhere, and for
anyone, to believe anything upon
insufficient evidence” (182c2).
• The failure to sufficiently interrogate one’s
beliefs, or to suppress legitimate doubt
about them, “…is one long sin against
mankind” (183c1).
• What are the implications of Clifford’s
position for belief in God?
JAMES, “THE WILL TO BELIEVE”
• In this essay, James considers epistemological issues like
those raised by Clifford.
• His aim is to establish the conditions under which belief in
God is epistemically justifiable.
• He begins with a specification of two basic concepts: beliefs
and options.
James calls any proposed belief an hypothesis. Some hypotheses are
“live,” by which James means that we might actually come to
accept it. Others are “dead” in that they are not real possibilities for
us, given the constellation of our other beliefs.
•
•
Clearly, the difference is not intrinsic but rather related to individual
hypothesizers.
On option is a question about which of opposing hypotheses we
should accept. Options are slightly more complex: they can be living
or dead, forced or unavoidable, momentous or trivial.
•
•
For James, a “genuine” option is one which “forced, living, and
momentous” (200c1).
CONTRA CLIFFORD
• James asserts that when an option is genuine, and
cannot be settled by intellectual means, one may
and indeed must let one’s non-rational nature
make the choice.
• One may believe what one hopes to be true, or what
makes one happiest.
• This is obviously a rejection of Clifford’s insistence
that in such cases one is morally obliged to
suspend judgment.
• For James, to suspend judgment is itself a choice,
and one with the same risks of affirmative choice:
“losing the truth” (200c2).
GENUINE OPTIONS?
• Somewhat surprisingly, perhaps, James goes on to
exclude a number of significant options from the list
genuine ones.
• Options in the science are typically not momentous he
suggests, and so here the requirement of
epistemologically acceptable justification is
appropriate.
• The same is true, presumably, of all sorts of intellectual
concerns where, “The attitude of skeptical balance is
the absolutely wise one if we would escape mistakes”
(200c2).
• What he notably does not consider are examples like
Clifford’s, where the wellbeing of others is concerned.
A THEORY OF RELIGION
• Perhaps James can be excused for this oversight,
because he has as his goal evaluating the status of
what we can call the Religious Option.
• To do so, he has to offer an, admittedly generic,
theory of Religion.
• To do so, he boils religion down to two claims:
1.
2.
“[T]he best things are the more eternal,” that is, the most
basic, definitive things.
Human beings are better if they believe 1, even if it cannot
be demonstrated or justified.
THE RELIGIOUS OPTION
• So, the religious option is the option between
accepting the truth of this account of religion or
denying it.
• Is this a genuine option?
•
•
•
Either it’s live, or the conversation ends here.
It’s momentous, according to the second of the two claims.
It’s also forced, because “waiting to see” we lose the good
specified in 2.
• Contrary to expectations, and the bulk of the Natural
Theological considerations we’ve examined, Claim 2 is
for James the key to the whole.
•
How does this alter the analysis of someone like Flew? If James
is right, than this seems a better way of responding than that
offered by Geivett.
SO SHOULD WE BELIEVE IN GOD?
• On the assumption that the option is genuine, and that no
intellectual analysis can decide it, James’s position is that we
are free to believe what we want.
• However, on the assumption that humans are governed by
two epistemological imperatives, believe truth and avoid
error, not every belief is equally supported.
• James assumes that if God exists then the knowledge that
God exists is an immensely valuable sort of knowledge in
itself, whereas the knowledge that God does not exist, if God
does not exist, is worth much less.
•
Someone like Clifford suspends judgment because he would rather
miss out on the truth than risk being wrong. James himself regards the
value of being right about God’s existence as worth any risks that
belief might bring with it.
• And so he concludes that it is better to believe than not.
•
Not because there’s evidence, but rather in the wish to believe that
God exists if God does in fact exist.